Sonic Roll looks like a faithful board game adaptation of the blue blur’s retro video game world
Rolling around at the speed of sound.
Sonic Roll is the latest board game based on everyone’s favourite spiny mammal and his motley cast of friends as they once again cooperate to thwart the dastardly plans of recurring foe, Dr. Eggman.
We don’t know much about Kess Entertainment’s upcoming board game apart from the company working directly with Sega and that they plan to deliver retail copies in January of next year. Kess has recently been on a spree of board game adaptations, porting Spy X Family, Street Fighter V, Contra and Mega Man from their respective media to the kitchen table.
Our one image of the game, posted to Kess Entertainment’s social media, shows components representing a lot of familiar elements from the classic 2-dimensional, side-scrolling version of Sonic. Players will race through levels such as Green Hill Zone, collecting ring tokens and power up cards while bashing Badniks who get in the way.
Each character seems to have their own colour-coded dice - blue for Sonic, yellow for Tails, red for Knuckles and pink for Amy - that they must roll and place along the segmented path through a Zone in order to race towards check marks or the big ring at the end of a level. There’s even blue and red orb tiles representing the special stages and the chaos emerald cards you presumably need to collect to unlock access to them.
Boards for each of the primary-hued heroes (and Amy) show dice combos that might allow players to combine their efforts to pull off special moves. For example, Sonic’s board contains a move that uses six of his own dice but also team-ups with both Knuckles and Tails. Dice interactions would set Sonic Roll apart from Kess’ previous titles - Spy x Family: Mission for Peanuts was a Love Letter-esque social deduction game with hidden roles (befitting the anime’s premise) while Mega Man Adventures used a combination of action cards and character-unique dice to create a cooperative challenge.
The box art will be a big draw for fans of the Sega Genesis-era Sonic. Comic illustrator Tracy Yardley, known for his storied career on the Sonic the Hedgehog comics, has created a cover that looks ripped from a plastic clamshell video game case, circa 1991.
This isn’t the only Sonic tabletop game on the horizon, as Monster Hunter and Elden Ring board game adaptor Steamforged Games previously teased a Sonic card game project in the works alongside something pertaining to Sea of Thieves. It’s been two years since that announcement - maybe it fell prey to the Death Egg Zone.
More information about Sonic Roll is supposedly coming in the near future, ahead of its January 2024 release date. You can sign up for emails on Kess Entertainment’s website.